When the recent Torrance High School graduate was 11 years old, a yo-yo demonstrator came to his middle school and performed several tricks at an assembly. At the end of the show, he handed out several yo-yos to students for free – including Kim, who soon fell in love with the classic toy.

“It was a very, very simple kind of hobby when I first started,” said Kim, who is now 18. “All you needed was this one toy and you practiced it over and over again.”

Kim began attending free weekend yo-yo classes at Sunshine Kite Co. on the Redondo Beach pier, where he learned several tricks and more about yo-yo technique.

“He was already halfway decent,” said Tom Fine, owner of Sunshine Kite Co. “We had some instructors and he came down and just started.”

After two years of practicing, Kim decided to take his hobby to the next level.

“After a while after you play with yo-yos you start making up your tricks. You push the envelope,” he said. “There aren’t enough tricks for you to learn so you have to make up your own and that kind of leads you into becoming a competitor.”

His early competitions, Kim said, were not a huge success.

“When I first started I had no idea,” he said. “I was young and didn’t really understand the stage presence in it and my tricks were a little bit weaker than they are now.”

Part of the problem, he added, was nervousness. When Kim first began competing, he participated in freestyle events, where he would perform a two- to three-minute routine set to music.

“It’s mainly just getting over being nervous and being able to apply tricks full-scale while you’re up there and being watched by everyone,” Kim said. “The nervousness didn’t go away for me for about a year or two.”

Now, with five years of competition and more than 5,000 yo-yos under his belt, Kim said he feels confident with his work.

“I’m rarely nervous on stage anymore,” he said.

And he shouldn’t be. Since he first began competing, Kim has taken part in five to six major contests per year – in addition to local and regional events – and has won several, including the 13 to 16-year-old age division at the 2005 National Yo-Yo Contest in Chico. He also travels to Florida each year for the World Yo-Yo Contest in Orlando – which Kim will attend again Aug. 13.

Next up for Kim, however, is today’s Bill Liebowitz Classic in West Hollywood, which serves as the Southwest Yo-Yo Regional contest. There, Kim will compete in two categories – one freestyle event where players perform tricks with one yo-yo, and another where the toys are not actually attached to the players hand. Rather, a counterweight is at the other end of the string.

While Kim enjoys winning, he said the yo-yo community is one of the reasons he’s remained involved in the activity.

“We’re all just a big group of friends,” Kim said. “The community is real laid-back – we’re not really competitive at all. It’s only the bigger contests when the pressure’s on. We usually are just really chill and like to see innovation and new tricks.”

Innovation is what motivated Kim, in 2005, to start manufacturing aluminum precision yo-yos, which spin more smoothly than regular plastic toys.

“I got really interested in making my own yo-yos with different shapes and different performance values, so I checked out a few local machine shops and brought them some yo-yos and got really good results from it,” he said.

That prompted Kim to make his own toys, and while he insists that his company, B.I.O. Industries, is a “do it yourself, garage band type of thing,” he has had success with his yo-yos, which are available for sale online and at Sunshine Kite Co.

“I really enjoy making something and having creative control over something and seeing a finished product,” he said. “It’s in no way a career or anything, but it’s definitely expanded my love for the hobby. And I get free yo-yos out of it.”

Kim also began teaching younger kids how to yo-yo. He works as a junior instructor at Sunshine Kite Co., and Fine said he was pleased to see Kim grow from student to instructor.

“A lot of people will be really secretive of what they have and not want to show people,” he said. “Since he was a little kid, Alex always loved being the one showing other kids things. It’s just cool watching him grow up and having fun.”

While Kim, who will attend El Camino College in the fall, said yo-yoing will remain a hobby – not a profession – he believes it’s a good experience for anyone who might be interested.

“I definitely like the fact that it’s not very widely known or widely appreciated, but I would definitely recommend it to somebody,” Kim said. “Even at the level of a toy it’s very unique and fun.”

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